Tattoos
by stuckbeingrachel
Summary: A game of Never Have I Ever leads to learning things about a certain blonde, as well as Anubis House's resident bookworm. (I have no idea where this came from!) R&R! Jara FTW! This has nothing to do with the 12DOC! I don't own HOA!


**I have no idea where this came from but I was reading a tattoo fic for iCarly and then one for HOA but it was about Nina and Fabian. I liked this idea because I was thinking Jerome with a tattoo and then I began thinking that he would probably have multiple tattoos. So, this is a thing with Jara and I love it but you don't have to. I don't have the links to any of the tattoos but if you want to know what the hieroglyphics look like, go to my profile (vote on the poll real quick), go to the bottom of my bio and under _Your Name in Egyptian Hieroglyphics! _you'll find a link! ENJOY!**

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"Let's play Never Have I Ever!" Amber suggested.

The teens had been trying to find something to do, due to a day off school. They all sat around the common room, except for Jerome. They all groan.

"Oh, come on, it's better than nothing." Amber scolded.

"Fine, how are we doing this?" Eddie sighed.

"We sit in a circle over here and hold up five fingers, just to start. We'll go around the circle and I'll go first."

They all followed her instructions and she tapped her chin in thought.

"Never have I ever, drank coffee." She smiled.

Nina, Patricia, Eddie, Joy and Mick put on finger down and they moved on around the circle.

By the time they landed back on Amber, Nina had two fingers up, Fabian had three, Patricia had two, Alfie had one, Amber had two, Joy had three, Mara had one, and Mick and Eddie were out. As Amber was about to speak the front door opened and closed and Jerome strutted into the room, typing away on his phone.

"Jerome what happened?" Mara gasped.

The others stared at him with wide eyes. Jerome's head shot up and he turned to Mara. His right arm and right side of his neck were both bandaged.

"What do you mean?" he asked looking over his left arm.

"The other arm, dude," Eddie pointed out.

"Oh, nothing, don't worry about it."

"But what happened—" Mara pressed.

"It's a secret, shh…" he put a finger to his lips, telling her to be quiet about it and sat down between Patricia and Nina. "So, we're playing…Never Have I Ever? Psh, so juvenile." He muttered but held his hand up anyway and told them to tell him they'd said so he could catch up. When they finished he was left with one finger.

"Alright, never have I ever…" Amber drifted off and smiled devilishly. "Gotten a real tattoo." she finished and her grey eyes flitted over the group. Everyone kept their fingers up. Except for Jerome, and then Mara backed out of the circle with a blush. Everyone's eyes bulged out of their heads.

"Real tattoo, Mars." Mick reminded her in a whisper.

Jerome smirked and looked at Mara with interest clearly written on his face.

"Mara Jaffray has a tattoo? I don't believe it." he shook his head.

She blushed harder.

When he saw her blush he realized she really did have one.

"Oh, that is so hot," he breathed with a grin.

"Well, I don't believe that you have a tattoo." she retorted.

"That's because I don't have one." he shrugged.

"But you put your finger down." Joy said.

"Yeah, I don't have one tattoo. I have several." He smirked at his words. He enjoyed twisting others' words, whether to hear what he wants or to correct them to make him sound smarter.

"How many do you have?" Nina asked.

Jerome looked at the ceiling in thought and counted on his fingers. "Eight."

Mara's jaw dropped.

"What are they?" Mick asked.

"Where are they? I don't see any." Patricia looked him over.

"Yeah, can we them? Fabian asked.

He shrugged. He gripped the hem of his t-shirt, standing, and Joy held her hands out, waving them frantically.

"Woah, what are you doing?"

"Showing you my tattoos; they're in places that are hidden by my pants and shirt, so I don't get in trouble at school. They are forbidden you know. But today, I decided not to follow that rule anymore. I got this one that will be shown no matter what I wear." He explained and slipped out of his shirt and then began to pull his bandages away. "It was raining and I can't get my new one wet for 48 hours."

When he pulled it away he turned around and pointed at the tattoo that stretched across his pale shoulder blades. A brown wooden cross with rocks at the base of it and a piece of purple clothe draped around the top. "That's the first one I got. The second one is right here."

He turned to profile view and motioned to a couple colored Egyptian hieroglyphics on his left side. "I'm not going to tell you what they mean though, so don't ask."

"It's a name isn't it?" Fabian asked.

"…yes." Jerome mumbled and pointed at a tattoo on his left shoulder.

"Aw, is wittle Jewome in wove?" Patricia teased with a playful smirk.

"Let's move on shall we?" he ignored her joke and the others looked up at him in surprise.

The next tattoo was just a plain black star. The next one was on his lower back, black and white words that read 'Awake and Alive'. He then lifted the right leg of his black dress pants to his knee and showed them swirls and hooks of black on his calf. He told them it had no meaning, just that he thought it looked cool. He then pointed to Greek symbols on his right breast that he told them meant 'Forgiven'. The last one he pointed to was the one that had been hidden by the bandage. Blue lines that look to be veins, or vines, started at a blue band at his wrist and slithered up his arm to his shoulder, up his neck and stopped at his neckline.

"And that's all." he shrugged, shrugging back into his shirt.

"Wow. Why do you have so many?" Amber asked.

"I get bored. It's also my way of expressing myself whenever something good or bad has happened in my life." Jerome replied, running a hand through his hair. "But, I'm curious; Mara, where and what is your tattoo?"

"Nowhere, nothing." She shook he head, blush creeping onto her once cooled cheeks.

"Can I try to find it?" he grinned at her impishly.

"No," she looked at him appalled and dropped her right arm from playing with her hair to rest her palm on the floor.

He watched her and smiled, blue eyes flitting over her entire tensed body.

"Stop undressing her with your eyes, creep." Patricia smacked him upside the head.

"It's a red rose on your right hip." He announced, crossing his arms proudly, ignoring Patricia's hit and warning.

Mara's brown eyes grew wide and the others' eyes snapped to her. She swallowed.

"How did you know that?"

"Your favorite flower is a red rose and unconsciously you had dropped your arm so that you could cover your right hip. You just seem to be the kind of girl to get a flower tattoo. Why'd you get it?"

"Yeah, and when; I never noticed it when you and I were roommates." Amber said.

"I don't want to talk about It." she blushed and left the room quickly.

"See ya later." Jerome grinned and followed her out of the room and outside where the rain was letting up.

Mara sat on the steps of the porch, looking out at the misty grounds of the school.

"So, am I not allowed to see it?" he asked, taking a seat next to her.

She jumped and looked at him. "No."

"Oh, come on, isn't there some way I can see it? And maybe even learn the story behind it?" he pushed.

She watched him warily and took a deep breath. "I will if you tell me the stories behind your tattoos, and what those Egyptian symbols mean."

Jerome raised an eyebrow at her and felt the corner of his lips twitch into a smirk. "Deal." He held out a hand and she shook it with a nod.

"You go first." Mara ordered.

He chuckled and ran a hand through his hair.

"The first one, the cross, I got when I turned fifteen. I had just gotten out of a lot of bad habits and became a Christian. I wanted a way to explain my religion and got a tattoo. It's permanent and I liked the idea. I had always wanted a tattoo. So, when I first got it, I decided to use tattoos as ways to express my feelings, in any way.

"The star I got when Poppy came to school. I was ecstatic when she came. Don't tell anyone I said this but, she's like a star to me. That's why I got a star. When she was first born I swore she had glowed like a star. Of course she didn't but, I called her my star for a while but then I moved on to Poopy." He shrugged with a smile and then continued after a sigh.

"Awake and Alive is a song title. I heard the song a little while after I first became a Christian, when I was about to go to my old ways. The song is really good, you should look it up. The swirls, the meaning behind them is a little different from all the others; they're twisted and complicated, they remind me and represent my relationship with someone. Then, 'Forgiven', well, you can probably figure that one out.

"And last, I got this one," he motioned to his arm with the blue vines. "Because I've been thinking a lot about my mom and step-dad; I used the vines because I considered them to be like my anger and hatred toward them, for leaving me here and not coming back. Vines just keep growing and growing but they've got to stop sometime, don't they? Well, they did today. I just stopped hating Joan and Arthur. I got the vines in blue because blue has always seemed like such a soothing color to me, and when I stopped hating them for everything they've ever done to me and Poppy, I felt so calm. I was at peace and it felt amazing.

"So, as you can see, they've stopped." He pointed to his neck.

"Wow, well, my tattoo has no meaning like that. I got it because of my first ever boyfriend. In freshman year, a 'bad boy' had asked me out. I didn't tell anyone about him as he and I just ran off every night doing something. Then, about a month into our relationship, he convinced me to get a tattoo. So, I did. I regretted it later because he broke up with me about a week afterwards but I was just glad it wasn't something that had to do with him." she shrugged and lifted the right side of her blouse, pushing her jeans down a little, revealing a big red rose, fully bloomed with three green leaves.

"I said it once and I'll say it again, that is so hot." He sighed, eyes glued to her hip.

She blushed and Then her eyes snapped back at him with a glare. "Hey, you never told me what the symbols mean and why you got them!"

Jerome nervously rubbed the back of his neck. "I was kind of hoping that you wouldn't remember that."

"Why?"

"Well, you were glad you hadn't gotten a tattoo about that guy, meanwhile, I rarely regret it."

"It was a girl, wasn't it?"

"Is a girl." He corrected. "She and I never dated but I love her and I don't regret getting the tattoo, even if she'll never be with me."

"Why wouldn't she?"

"She doesn't like me like that, Mara." He said grimly, resting his chin on his palm.

"How do you know?" Mara asked, a delicate eyebrow rose skeptically.

"Because I know her. I tried being her friend but even after all of that she didn't give me the time of day."

"Do I know her? Maybe I can find out if she likes you or not?" she suggested.

"Yeah, you know her, you two are like this," he crossed his forefinger and middle finger over each other and held them up for her to see. "Practically the same person."

"It's not Nina is it?"

"No."

"Joy."

"Psh."

"Patricia?"

"Why?"

"Amber?"

"Oh, gosh, no."

"Then who?" she cried in desperation.

"You really can't figure it out?" he asked, his voice barely a whisper. He stood but didn't leave.

Mara's brain swarmed with thoughts, questions answered and unanswered. She couldn't believe what he had just said. She was the only other person she could think of that he'd ever spoken to. Besides the girls in the house, she had no other girl friends. Did he just indirectly say that he loved her?

"Can I show you something?" she said softly, standing also.

He gave a small nod but didn't look at her, a frown etched into his pale face.

She lifted the left side of her purple blouse and turned so he could see. His eyes flickered to her, back to the fog and then snapped back to look at her side.

"It's new." She told him.

He sank to his knees and ran a finger over the colored Egyptian hieroglyphics; a snake, a reed, a mouth, a lasso, an owl, and then another reed. He licked his lips and looked up at her.

"Let me guess,"

Her lips prevented him from finishing and he wrapped his arms around her waist as she held his face in her hands. He pulled away and rose from his crouched position. He tugged her shirt down to cover the tattoo and pushed some hair behind her ear.

"I'm the only one allowed to see that. Remember that." he warned.

Resting her head against his chest with arms tightly wound around his waist, Mara giggled. Jerome's arms curled around her shoulders and he kissed her head.

"I love you." she whispered.

"I love you." he echoed and kissed her hair.

"Whoa, didn't expect that!" Alfie cried, jumping back in shock as he stepped onto the porch.

"Aw! You two are adorable." Amber grinned and Jerome groaned.

"Great."

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**What y'all think? REVIEW AND LET ME KNOW! I'll try to find the tattoos I imagined up though, and I'll let y'all know if I do!**

**I'm currantly workin' on a bunch of drabbles for HOC and a bunch of one-shots for different movies and TV shows! So keep an eye out for those!**

**For "All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever." And this word is the good news that was preached to you. -1 Peter 1:24-25**

**Love y'all!**

**-Rachel**


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